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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23265496">Hero</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/drarryangels/pseuds/drarryangels'>drarryangels</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Drarry One-Shots [16]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Established Relationship, Hurt, Injury, M/M, PTSD, Post-War, Scars, Trauma, War, curse, hero - Freeform</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-03-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 03:14:05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>614</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23265496</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/drarryangels/pseuds/drarryangels</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The truth holds great pain. That was a lesson Harry learned early on. But no matter how many times he tells himself he's healed, no matter how many times Draco kisses it better... the truth still hurts.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Drarry One-Shots [16]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1672888</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>75</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Harry Potter</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Hero</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“It’s going to scar,” Draco said quietly, leaning back in the worn chair by Harry’s bed in St. Mungo’s. Harry nodded firmly, his lips pursed and nothing in his eyes. </p>
<p>Draco didn’t know what to say, so he sat and watched Harry lean back into the pillows with a heaving breath and close his eyes far away from sleep. Draco knew every scar on Harry’s body like he knew the ones on his own: the thin writing on the back of his hand, the raised oval over his heart, the pencil down his forearm, the nicks under his jaw from shattering glass, the ring around his bicep from an unexplained accident with a table corner, the jagged flick on the back of his right heel from a curse aptly named after the Muggle hero Achilles. His mouth knew the lightning on Harry’s forehead. </p>
<p>Draco did not know how Harry felt about this new scar. It had not had time to be healed and kissed yet, and it was different from the others. Most of the others had been a result of war, and the other ones after that were from the ins and outs of a normal life. This one was not from either. </p>
<p>Draco leaned forward in the chair again and swept his fingers over Harry’s forehead and through his hair. “Love,” he whispered. Harry opened his eyes and sealed his lips into the palm of Draco’s hand. “I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>Harry shook his head and said nothing, lifting Draco’s hand away and entwining their hands together. Harry held Draco’s hand tightly and hesitantly pulled down the covers from his waist. Draco watched as he lifted his own shirt and stared at the panicked waves of his breath in his stomach. Draco looked and tried not to cry because if he did Harry would surely cry too, and Draco didn’t think he could bear that. </p>
<p>A word bore into Harry’s skin, raw and infected and fresh. Crawling down his stomach into his hip bone. One that had been carved there by a passerby on the street. Of course, they hadn’t known it at first. Someone had thrown the curse under a flashing cloak, and it hit Harry before Draco knew it had been thrown at all. Harry had buckled over, and the two of them hustled straight off to Mungo’s to make sure Harry was okay. But there was nothing; the curse had left no mark.</p>
<p>Two days later, the itching began. And along with that, gasps in the night that belonged to pain and not pleasure, constant scratching at the dark skin over Harry’s sides, tiny sounds of discomfort, the dropping of Draco’s heart every time Harry winced. And then, almost a week after that, the word appeared, scrawling from the inside out. </p>
<p>Harry cried. A lot. Draco hugged Harry, and cried. A lot. </p>
<p>And now they were here, in St. Mungo’s, and Harry couldn’t look at his own skin, and Draco didn’t know how to touch him without him catapulting into a spiral of self hatred. His own self hatred or Harry’s, he didn’t know. </p>
<p>There wasn’t any way to make this better, or make it go away. The Healers said it wasn’t susceptible to magic and they would have to wait it out to see if it would heal or stay. It had healed enough that they could go home, but this scar was different. It would’ve stayed under Harry’s soul even if they scarring hadn’t started to edge on the outer corners of the word. It would’ve held on and clung to him like it had since he turned one. </p>
<p>The word was true, but truth held great pain. </p>
<p>
  <em>Hero.</em>
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